In the early part of the last decade when Pete Carroll was doing some interesting and very Damn fun things at USC a handful of the members of Coaches Hot Seat (long before Coaches Hot Seat existed which began in January 2007) would stop by USC football practices while in Los Angeles on business which was a place that was akin to a traveling circus that had a Helluva lot of interesting people hanging around including lots of media (kudos to Coach Orgeron for opening up USC practices again!) and during those visits to USC sometime in 2001 or 2002 was the first time we encountered…

Lane Monte Kiffin

As best as we can recall the general consensus about Lane Kiffin during that time in the early years of Pete Carroll at USC was something like…

“That’s Monte Kiffin’s son Lane and one day a few years from now Kiffin might get a shot at something like the San Diego State or San Jose State job.”

As the years went by and the Pete Carroll machine at USC continued to roll along one day in January 2007 only a couple of weeks after Coaches Hot Seat went up live on the Internet the following story broke which stunned us then and is a hilarious read at this moment in time:

“After falling short in their attempt to hire USC assistant head coach Steve Sarkisian, the Raiders tapped the Trojans again on Monday night and came away with offensive coordinator Lane Kiffin as their new head coach.

The 31-year-old Kiffin signed a five-year deal to succeed Art Shell. A news conference to announce Kiffin’s hiring is scheduled for 4 p.m. ET Tuesday in Oakland.

Age will not be an issue, Kiffin said.

“I’m extremely ready for this opportunity,” Kiffin told the Minneapolis Star Tribune for Tuesday’s editions. “The last six years [at USC] have prepared me for this. I’m extremely excited to have the chance to restore this program back to where it’s been before.”

Kiffin, who grew up in the Minneapolis area, was passed over earlier in the offseason for the job at the University of Minnesota, which went to Denver Broncos tight ends coach Tim Brewster.

“All the things that happened the last few weeks have happened for a reason, and everything has worked out the way it was supposed to for everyone,” Kiffin told the Star Tribune. “At a time like this, you really think about everyone who has helped you along the way, and a lot of those people are back in Minneapolis. I’m grateful for that.””

Boy, Minnesota dodged a bullet there but then they had to fire Tim Brewster also!

To us here at Coaches Hot Seat who were still living in the San Francisco Bay area at the time we really didn’t give much thought to Lane Kiffin being hired by the Oakland Raiders because everyone knew by then that Al Davis had for the most part lost his Freaking Mind and if Al wanted to further destroy the Raiders by hiring someone that people with basic common sense knew was only maybe-qualified to be the head coach at San Diego State or San Jose State then destroy away Al Davis!

Alas, it didn’t take long for a friend of ours that worked for the Oakland Raiders to call one of us and say (paraphrased since it was so long ago):

“This Kiffin kid is a real beaut. This could get real ugly before Kiffin is fired and I have no doubt Al will fire him eventually unless he wins a lot of football games.”

Coaches Hot Seat: “What’s the problem with Kiffin?”

Oakland Raiders Friend: “Let’s just say I wouldn’t have hired him to empty the garbage cans here but Al…..”

Coaches Hot Seat: “Yes…Al…..?”

Oakland Raiders Friend: “Let’s just leave it at I wouldn’t have hired Kiffin to empty the garbage cans around here!”

Similar type messages from our friend at the Oakland Raiders went on for several months and then the Raiders began the 2007 season by going…

2 – 8

…in their first 10 games before finishing at…

4 – 12

….on the ’07 season.

Needless to say we heard all kinds of stories about Lane Kiffin’s “coaching skills and attitude” over the next several months and throughout the 2008 off-season and as the ’08 NFL regular season approached we had some serious doubts that Kiffin would even make it to the first game.

Well, after four games in 2008 when the Raiders went…

1 – 3

…Lane Kiffin was fired by Raiders’ owner Al Davis on October 1, 2008 who did the firing in a very interesting way to say the least…

….which of course led to this very entertaining press conference by Al Davis:

We will let the people reading this blog to draw their own conclusions on what they think of Al Davis but in our opinion here at Coaches Hot Seat when Lane Kiffin was fired in October 2008 by the Oakland Raiders based upon what we were hearing from people that we trust completely our unanimous opinion of Lane Kiffin was….

Lane Kiffin is a Self-Righteous, Pompous, Arrogant Ass who believes he is God’s Gift to Planet Earth

AND

Lane Kiffin is a Sorry Excuse for a Human Being

Of course, less than 2 months later we were stunned like everyone else to hear that then Tennessee AD Mike Hamilton was going to hire Lane Kiffin…

Well, as fans of college football know and even our wives that follow little else but Stanford and Cal football know what transpired over the past 4.5 years when Lane Kiffin was at Tennessee and USC which was in our opinion a reign of error, embarrassment, disgrace and disgust for those two fine institutions and which was mercifully and thankfully brought to an end by USC AD Pat Haden in the early morning hours of September 29, 2013 has been one of the more entertaining and disastrous coaching careers in the history of football in our Republic.

As one of our wives said this morning at breakfast as ESPN’s SportsCenter was reporting on the firing of Lane Kiffin:

“Thank Goodness the long national nightmare is over.”

…to which the CHS member said to his wife:

“Don’t be too sure there isn’t at least one Moron out there in America that might hire Lane Kiffin again!”

CHS Member (rolling his eyes): “There are lots of very Damn stupid people running athletic departments and NFL teams!”

As we have written many times in the Coaches Hot Seat Blog….

We have been and are today fans of USC football and we have been fans of USC football going back 40-plus years now and in the 1970s college football in the western United States was…

USC Football

….and we saw the Trojans play in a dozen-plus different stadiums including many times in the LA Coliseum when USC football was on top of the world and relative to that we have a message we would like to deliver to Pat Haden.

Memo to USC AD Pat Haden: Thank You.

Yes, the long national nightmare of Lane Kiffin being in the game of football is over for the foreseeable future until of course the next BIG SUCKER comes along that falls for the Bullshit snake oil that Lane Kiffin and his agent will no doubt be peddling to the Morons out there in the world in the coming days, weeks, years and decades (let’s hope for decades!) and for that we are very thankful that Pat Haden has brought the curtain down on Lane Kiffin at USC which in our opinion is something that Haden should have done at the latest at the end of the 2012 football season especially in the wake of the disaster that was USC and Kiffin’s performance in El Paso in the Sun Bowl.

Not that it really matters anymore but OUR opinion here at Coaches Hot Seat has not really changed from the opinion we formed of Lane when he was the head coach at the Oakland Raiders which was then and is still today…

Lane Kiffin is a Self-Righteous, Pompous, Arrogant Ass who believes he is God’s Gift to Planet Earth

AND

Lane Kiffin is a Sorry Excuse for a Human Being

….but we also would like to add another opinion in this spot….

Lane Kiffin is a Selfish Bastard that it seems has somehow come to the conclusion that everyone on Earth, the Earth itself and even the Universe revolves around and should serve Lane Kiffin.

Sorry Lane Kiffin BUT the world DOES NOT revolve around your Sorry Ass and if you have a lick of Common Sense you would travel to Rome, Italy to National Gallery of Ancient Art and take a few minutes, hours or days….whatever you require….to look at this painting…

….and think about what all that time you have spent on this Earth enraptured in your own “greatness” and blaming other people for your own failures has gotten you besides being the butt of Millions of jokes over the past 6 years. Let’s hope Lane Kiffin doesn’t pass a full-length mirror on the way or he may go the way of Narcissus!

Good riddance Lane Kiffin and if the people in the game of football in America have IQs over room temperature you will…

NEVER BE BACK.

Needless to say on Sunday night after dinner with our families we raised a cold one and said a toast to the firing of Lane Kiffin and in all the firings of coaches in the seven years that Coaches Hot Seat has been in existence that is the FIRST time we have ever done that!

IF any or all of our opinions above on Lane Kiffin seem harsh then you should hear what we really think about Lane Kiffin that we are choosing to not put into this blog that make the above look very mild by comparison.

Maybe we will put those opinions of Kiffin in the book that Coaches Hot Seat is writing:

The Hot Seat: Inside the World of High Stakes, High Pressure and Big Money College Football

As you can imagine in galleys it is already a very entertaining and funny read!

With Lane Kiffin now dispatched….Let’s get to the Post Week 5 Coaches Hot Seat Ranking and that of course means…

1. Paul Pasqualoni, Connecticut – With UConn’s loss to MAC Conference member Buffalo on Saturday by a score of…

41 – 14

….which puts Paul Pasqualoni’s overall record at Connecticut now at…

10 – 18

…we can’t think of too many ways that Pasqualoni can save his job at UConn without a minor miracle because with these games remaining…

South Florida At Cincinnati At UCF Louisville At SMU At Temple Rutgers Memphis

….the Huskies will be lucky if they win more than 4 games in 2013 and Pasqualoni needs at least 6 wins in 2013 to return for the 2014 season.

In our opinion here at Coaches Hot Seat the Connecticut job is a pretty good job especially for someone that has ties to the New York – New England area and with the right head coach we have no doubt UConn will be winning again soon…..assuming of course UConn makes a head coaching change in the next few months!

2. Terry Bowden, Akron – With the…

31 – 14

….loss to Bowling Green on Saturday Terry Bowden’s Akron team is now…

1 – 4

…on the season and Bowden’s overall record with the Zips is now…

2 – 15

….and…

0 – 9

..in MAC Conference play and only the folks at Akron can determine if the above records are acceptable or not and how long this losing can go on.

Akron has some football players because they could not have played Michigan to a virtual tie in the Big House in Ann Arbor if they didn’t so we have to wonder…

What the Hell is going on at Akron Terry Bowden?

3. Mack Brown, Texas – With Mack Brown and Texas having a bye week in Week 5 we tried our best to get a “bottom-line wins and losses” number on what Mack Brown has to do in 2013 to return for the 2014 season by calling our Texas-alum fishing buddies in the Austin area and their unanimous opinion which is an opinion that is a few notches down the totem poll from the Texas Billionaire Boys that are actually driving the bus at UT is…

“Texas needs 9 wins in ’13 which includes a win over Oklahoma for Mack to return in 2014.”

Coaches Hot Seat: “With Texas already at 2 – 2 that means Texas has to go 7 – 1 the rest of the way including beating OU.”

Texas-alum fishing buddy: “That’s right and that loss at Baylor in the last game of the season better not be too bad either.”

Coaches Hot Seat: “So you see Mack Brown running the table in the next 7 games including a win over OU and then losing a close one to Baylor in Waco and then Brown will be back next season?”

Texas-alum fishing buddy: “You got it right Buster.”

Coaches Hot Seat: “Wow…..and don’t call me Buster! So what happens if Mack loses to OU but then runs the table including a win over Baylor in the final game?”

Texas-alum fishing buddy: “You must not be hearing me right Buster.”

Coaches Hot Seat: “Oh, I heard you right LeRoy. But we can’t imagine Texas firing Mack after he just went 9 – 3 that included a win over Oklahoma.”

Texas-alum fishing buddy: “Meet us in Dallas in two weeks and if UT loses to Oklahoma you tell me what you think after seeing the Texas fans after the game.”

At Iowa State Oklahoma AT TCU Kansas At West Virginia Oklahoma State Texas Tech At Baylor

….and just from where we sit here at Coaches Hot Seat IF Texas only loses 1 game the rest of the way even if it against Oklahoma we cannot image that Mack Brown will be fired at Texas at the end of the season….

On the other hand another loss to OU would be bad considering the scores in the UT – OU games in recent years:

2012: Oklahoma 63 – Texas 21

2011: Oklahoma 38 – Texas 26

2010: Oklahoma 28 – Texas 20

2009: Texas 16 – Oklahoma 13

2008: Texas 45 – Oklahoma 35

2007: Oklahoma 28 – Texas 21

2006: Texas 28 – Oklahoma 10

2005: Texas 45 – Oklahoma 12

2004: Oklahoma 12 – Texas 0

2003: Oklahoma 65 – Texas 13

For those counting….and we are….Mack Brown’s record against Oklahoma over the past decade is…

4 – 6

…..and if that won’t get you fired at Texas then almost nothing will!

First up though is the most important game which is the NEXT GAME at Iowa State this coming Thursday night on ESPN that the entire country will be watching.

Lose to Iowa State and the Mack Brown era at Texas will almost certainly be over come December and if that isn’t pressure then we don’t know what pressure is!

4. Charlie Weis, Kansas – This past Saturday everyone saw what that 13 – 10 Kansas win over La. Tech was really worth when a struggling Army team went to La. Tech and beat the Bulldogs by the score of…

35 – 16

….which in plain English means that…

Wet Tissue Paper

…could beat La. Tech right now and with Weis and Kansas now at 2 – 1 on the season and having these games left…

Texas Tech At TCU Oklahoma Baylor At Texas At Oklahoma State West Virginia At Iowa State Kansas State

….is there ANYONE out there that thinks Kansas will win even one game left on its schedule?

Oh, Charlie Weis has his hand up?

Enough said!

Even if Kansas football loses the rest of their game in 2013 to finish at…

2 – 10

…on the year we rather doubt that Kansas has $7.5 Million Dollars to pay Weis what they would have to pay him if they fired him after the season so Kansas fans IF things do go south with KU football in 2013 we can only say…

Get Used To It!

5. Kevin Wilson, Indiana – Before the season began we speculated that Kevin Wilson and Indiana had a decent chance to start off at 4 – 0 in 2013 BUT alas after 4 games the Hoosiers are…

2 – 2

…after wins over Indiana State and Bowling Green and losses to Navy and Missouri…..ALL HOME GAMES….and in their fifth game of the season Indiana plays another home game against Penn State which means the Hoosiers will play 4 of their last 7 games on the road which means the game against the Nittany Lions is a MUST WIN Game if Wilson and Indiana have hopes to go to a bowl game this season.

With these games left for Indiana…

Penn State At Michigan State At Michigan Minnesota Illinois At Wisconsin At Ohio State Purdue

…..it would probably take a minor miracle for the Hoosiers to win 4 of their last 8 games to get to 6 – 6 on the season which would be a step-forward for Indiana football and to get started on that goal of a postseason bowl beating Penn State on Saturday is a MUST.

6. Norm Chow, Hawaii – Anyone that watched the Fresno State – Hawaii game late on Saturday night – early Sunday morning saw something we have not seen from the Warriors in Norm Chow’s two years at the school:

Norm Chow and all the Hawaii coaches and players were coaching and playing like they desperately wanted to beat Fresno State!

And Hawaii almost did beat Fresno State after falling behind 42 – 3 with 6 minutes left in the third quarter before storming back with 34 unanswered points before losing 42 – 37 to the Bulldogs in what was nothing less than a thrilling game BUT here’s the kicker:

Norm Chow and Hawaii have to play the way they did in the second half against Fresno State in EVERY GAME for the ENTIRE GAME for the rest of the year!

Norm Chow and Hawaii are now…

0 – 4

…on the 2013 season and Chow’s overall record at Hawaii is now…

3 – 13

….and with these games left….

San Jose State At UNLV Colorado State At Utah State AT Navy San Diego State At Wyoming Army

…if Hawaii plays the way they did against Fresno State in the second half they can win 3 or more of the games left on their schedule BUT will Norm Chow and Hawaii play the rest of the season like they are…

Desperate to Win Each and Every Game?

Why the Hell not?

7. Ron English, Eastern Michigan – Now in his fifth season at Eastern Michigan Ron English has put up records of..

2009: 0 – 12 2010: 2 – 10 2011: 6 – 6 2012: 2 – 10 2013: 1 – 3

Overall Record: 11 – 41

MAC: 7 – 26

…and after starting the 2013 season at 1 – 3 Ron English is back on the Hot Seat and needing some wins in 2012 to keep the heat from rising even more starting with a win against a surging Buffalo team on Saturday in Buffalo which is followed by a game against Army at Army.

Good Luck to you Ron English!

8. Ron Turner, Florida International – In six seasons as the head coach at Florida International former FIU head coach Mario Cristobal put up records of…

….which is in our opinion an “above average performance” considering the difficulty in winning at a place like FIU and when Cristobal was fired at the end of last season we wondered who FIU was going to hire in his place because it had to be someone that was going to take the FIU football program to a new place above what Cristobal had achieved at the school BUT then we heard that FIU had hired…

Ron Turner.

Ron Turner….really?

In case you didn’t know Ron Turner was an assistant coach at Stanford for three years between 1989 and 1991 before taking the head coaching job at San Jose State for one season and then after many years in the NFL Turner was the head coach at Illinois for 8 seasons where he put up a record of….

Overall Record at Illinois: 35 – 57

….which included only TWO WINNING SEASONS.

As we said earlier…

FIU hired Ron Turner? What the Freaking Hell?

So what has Ron Turner done in his first season at FIU?

0 – 4 record including losses to Maryland, UCF, Louisville and Bethune-Cookman!

“I noticed that Pelini had a number of high-profile columnists and media members that write and talk about college football that jumped to his immediate defense and spent a lot of time attacking the leaker of the audio tape instead of focusing on what Pelini actually said. What was that about?”

Coaches Hot Seat: “You mean why did Pelini get some sympathetic coverage in the media that covers college football?”

Communications Professor: “Yes.”

Coaches Hot Seat: “We talked about that very thing at Coaches Hot Seat as it was happening….as media members were rushing to the defend Bo Pelini and as wrote the names of the media members that were defending Pelini up on a board at Coaches Hot Seat Central we noticed a very interesting thing.”

Communications Professor: “What was that?”

Coaches Hot Seat: “All of the names of the media members that jumped out to defend Pelini are all media members that we believe Pelini has spent a considerable amount of time over the years schmoozing with in order to gain their confidence….and support….for just such a day when Pelini would be put under tremendous pressure whether for losing too many games as a head coach or something like this audio tape of Pelini tell Nebraska fans to “F – Off” getting out.”

Communications Professor: “Are you saying that just like politicians and CEOs spend time with the reporters and columnists to try and influence how they are reported on and talked about in the media that college football coaches do the same also?”

Coaches Hot Seat: “Of course they do and sad part is that many college head coaches laugh and joke about how easy it is to manipulate “X” or “Y” columnist just by giving him a little access and making him feel important and like he is on inside things going on with the team. Often moments after the reporter or media member leaves after getting their “inside information” the coach will be saying things like….well….things like what Pelini said on that tape about the Nebraska fans!”

Communications Professor: “Interesting. Do you guys keep up with which coach has influence over which columnist and media members?”

Coaches Hot Seat: “It’s not an exact science but we know which media members that coaches will call when they want something leaked or even repeated verbatim in the press and we also believe we know which media members will do almost anything for certain coaches because the media member believes he is a friend of the coach.”

Communications Professor: “This could be an interesting lesson for the class to see if they can by reading the stories of the top college football columnists figure out which coaches the media members are friends with and which coaches the media members do not like.”

Coaches Hot Seat: “You could call the lesson: How College Head Coaches Use the Media and Propaganda To Get Their Message Out!”

Communications Professor: “Perfect. See you guys soon!”

Coaches Hot Seat: “Yes, sir…see you soon!”

Getting back to Bo Pelini and his current situation at Nebraska realizing that we don’t give a Damn if Bo Pelini is the head coach at Nebraska for 1 or 25 more years Pelini is…

3 – 1

…on the season after wins over Wyoming, Southern Miss and South Dakota State which is like saying you have wins over…

Wet Tissue Paper U’s Football Team

…and a 41 – 21 loss at home to Nebraska with UCLA being the ONLY legitimate football team that the Huskers have played in 2013.

Pelini and Nebraska have left on the schedule…

Illinois At Purdue At Minnesota Northwestern At Michigan Michigan State At Penn State Iowa

….and if Nebraska is still NEBRASKA then the Huskers should have no problem winning their next three games and being…

6 – 1

…when Northwestern comes to Lincoln on November 2.

IF Nebraska beats Illinois on Saturday Bo Pelini will get off the top of the Coaches Hot Seat Rankings

BUT

IF the Huskers lose at home to the Illini Bo Pelini is going to learn quickly that even the polite Nebraska fans will have a few “F words” for him as he leaves the field after the game!

Our recommendation to Bo Pelini: Beat Illinois!

10. Skip Holtz, La. Tech – After Sonny Dykes left La. Tech for California at the end of last season we really didn’t know what to make of La. Tech hiring…

Skip Holtz

…as their new head coach because in our opinion after Skip’s mostly unsuccessful three years at South Florida that Skip really needed to take a year off from the game of football and possibly even get into doing some TV work following in the footstep of his Daddy Dr. Lou Holtz but then what the Hell do we know exactly….right?

Well, in his first season at La. Tech Skip Holtz is….

1 – 4

…with losses to NC State, Tulane, Kansas and Army and win over….wait for it….Lamar by a score of 27 – 14!

After seeing La. Tech give away a game to woeful Kansas a week ago we don’t really know what the Bulldogs will do with the rest of their games…

At UTEP North Texas Florida International Southern Miss At Rice Tulsa At Texas San Antonio

….but it is our opinion here at Coaches Hot Seat that if Sonny Dykes was still coaching La. Tech in 2013 that the Bulldogs would have finished the season NO WORSE than…